The Cypher

by Julian Rosado-Machain

  Thomas walked backwards; he couldn’t overcome the shock of seeing his grandfather like this. He wanted to hug his grandfather, but this just felt wrong. From the far side of the room, three figures clad in blue and black armor stepped into the light. Two of them looked like elves – their faces were covered with intricate green and blue tattoos and their eyes were rimmed with kohl. The third one was a mountain lion faun; he held a long lance and his eyes were bright yellow.

  “What have they done to you?”

  Morgan smiled and opened his arms. “Isn’t it wonderful?” he said. “I’ve been given a wonderful gift by my new friends.”

  “Your friend’s the Warmaster?”

  “That’s what Franco and his minions call him, but he’s not interested in war. Guardians Inc. and The Council of Twilight is the real enemy, Tom. They are the ones we should be opposing. They’re the ones killing nature. The world is dying because of them. Humanity has gone mad and they’re the ringleaders.”

  “You can’t really believe that.” Thomas stepped back.

  “Why not? Look at me!” Morgan opened his arms. “He’s given me purpose. A whole new life!”

  The warriors closed in on Morgan, keeping their hands close to their weapons.

  “And what are you giving in return, Grandpa?”

  “I have this power, Tom,” Morgan said stepping closer. “I know you have it too, and we can change the world with it.”

  “He’ll destroy us,” Thomas said. “Humans are not creatures of Magic. Has he told you what will happen to the world if we give him the Book?”

  “That’s another lie!” Morgan yelled. “Look at me! There’ll be no more sickness! No more death once we set things right. The world will be a magical place again.” Morgan extended a hand. “Help us, Tom. Come with us. Just talk with him. That’s all I ask.”

  “With the Warmaster?”

  “Yes,” Morgan offered his hand again. “He’s not what you’ve been led to believe.”

  “No,” Thomas said stepping closer to the tunnel. He’d seen what Wraith Magic had done to Tasha’s Kingdom; he’d been attacked by its creatures. Magic itself couldn’t stop the Wraiths. Even the elves had accepted that only technology and humans could save the world as they knew it. “They’re lying to you, gramps,” he said. “He tried to kill me, has he told you that? He sent monsters to kill me at home.”

  “It wasn’t him, Tom, they…” Morgan pointed back at the Azure Guards, “they saved me from those creatures! We were coming back for you.”

  Thomas stepped away. It was too much to take in. Who was lying and what was real? How could gramps have fallen to the Warmaster? All the things he’d learned at the mansion told him that the Guardians watched over humanity.

  “You do what you feel is right,” Gramps and his father always told him.

  He thought about Tony, Henri, Bolswaithe, Doctor Franco, and the Guardians – what they did and what they stood for, and it felt right.

  He was one of them and he couldn’t betray them.

  “I’m sorry Gramps,” he said turning around toward the tunnel.

  The room shook violently and ancient dust fell from the roof. A crack formed on one of the walls and Thomas lost his footing.

  One of the azure guards pulled out a hand crossbow and pointed it at Thomas. “We have to go now, Cypher,” he said to Morgan.

  Morgan stepped in front of the crossbow.

  Thomas paused. He saw the guard take a hard breath, measuring Morgan’s resolve. The mountain lion faun jumped forward with a roar. As he passed close to Morgan, he grabbed the faun’s arm. “I’ll put you down myself,” Morgan told the mountain lion. The faun bared his fangs, but stepped back.

  “He’s my grandson.” Morgan told the warrior with the crossbow.

  “He’s the enemy,” the warrior said, but Morgan didn’t flinch. The warrior lowered his crossbow throwing a last glance of disdain toward Thomas. The third Azure guard approached the wall behind them and a blue rift opened on the obsidian.

  Thomas stood up and ran toward the tunnel’s entrance.

  “Come on, Tom! Give us a chance!” Morgan pleaded. “Give me a chance!” but Thomas was already scrambling at the tunnel’s opening. The obsidian walls were cracking up and shards of rock cut his knees and hands. Thomas turned around with tears in his eyes and shook his head.

  “It doesn’t feel right, Gramps!” he yelled.

  Morgan lowered his eyes. For a moment, Thomas saw pride swelling in his grandfathers’ eyes.

  Morgan nodded at him with a knowing smile. “I love you, Tom! Don’t forget!” he said as the mountain lion faun pulled him away from the falling debris and toward the rift.

  Thomas looked away and ran through the tunnel as Ormagra violently shook. He had to scramble over sharp obsidian rocks that had broken from the walls. He heard Morgan calling out his love for him again before the tunnel behind him collapsed.

  “We have to leave quickly,” Bolswaithe said as he pulled Thomas from the tunnel. He had recovered completely and was now in full guardian mode. The lights in the room were flickering and the computers were short-circuiting on the floor. “The Doctor is waiting for us.”

  “Run!” Tony was shouting from the entrance of the room. He waited until Thomas and Bolswaithe passed in front of him.

  “The whole city is crumbling down!” Tony yelled. The structures and floors were cracking up. Whole sections of the city were falling into the chasm.

  “It’s coming to life,” Bolswaithe yelled back. “Tasha’s doing.” He pointed at the other side of the chasm. Tasha was chanting in front of the statue of a huge tentacle-laden beast. A sickly-green glow emanated from the statue and the structures surrounding it began to glow. They ran as fast as they could through the crumbling city. At least the little creatures had disappeared, but the glow spread over the streets and buildings.

  The tech running in front of Thomas yelled as one of the statues came to life and grabbed her with a tentacle. Tony fumbled with his gun as the statue pulled the tech toward its mouth.

  Henri flew in from the side and broke the tentacle with his hands, saving the tech from being crushed. He lifted the reanimating statue and threw it into the chasm.

  The flickering lights finally gave out, but the glow had become so intense that they could still see as they ran through the scaffolds and ledges. Henri flew in front, destroying any statue that was in their way before they could come back to life. They reached the entrance of the city and found Doctor Franco and Elise behind the statue of Perseus. The army they had prepared at the mansion was already setting up in the cave. At least a hundred men and fauns in full combat armor were forming a fire line against the city’s entrance.

  Doctor Franco waved at them from behind the fire line. A commander was relaying orders by their side.

  “What’s the situation?” he asked Thomas once they crossed behind the fire line.

  “It’s Tasha,” Thomas told him. “She’s waking up the city.”

  “King Seryaan was right.” Elise said. “She’s been corrupted.”

  “I thought you were going to Guatemala” Tony locked in a fresh battery pack for The Painless with a slap.

  “A ruse.” The Doctor answered. “We’ve suspected Tasha of being unstable for some time now, the crisis in Guatemala was too convenient. The King went to Ixkun and we followed you here,” the Doctor told him. “Now we know what she was planning. She’s calling on an ancient evil.” The Doctor stepped by the side of the statue. The entrance of Ormagra was alight with the green glow. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing.”

  “Hold positions!” the commander yelled and moved forward toward the line. “Ready weapons!”

  Strange creatures silhouetted against the glow. Their movements weaved a sickening dance as they approached them, and the entrance filled with unnatural groans and the sound of shoveling appendages.

  A wave of monsters stood before them, mouths filled with translucent teeth, horns ringed with barb
s and black malevolent eyes sprouted from stalks and along the glistening bodies of the Wraith.

  For a second the creatures stopped, and then turned their eyes toward Ormagra. With deliberate steps Tasha walked among them, her eyes had turned as black and featureless as those of the Wraith and dark streaks of oily tears ran down over her cheeks. The creatures opened a path for her to walk through and extended their appendages towards her. With a wicked smile she extended her hands in turn towards them, as if they were her pets, her children.

  “Tasha!” Thomas called out for her, maybe there was still hope.

  Tasha twitched, as if startled by a distant thunder. She looked towards Thomas and the creatures followed her movements.

  “Tasha” Thomas repeated and Tasha gave him a glare full of hatred, she lifted her hand and a sphere of dark energy formed on her palm.

  Tony had seen enough.

  “Sorry Thomas.” He said and opened fire directly at Tasha. The beam of light struck her hand peeling off dark ash as the sphere exploded right by her side charring off her clothing and hair.

  She let out a cry of pain and anger and the creatures began to race towards them.

  “Open fire!” the Doctor yelled pulling Thomas towards the statue.

  A hundred streams of light pierced the glow, turning the creatures’ grunts into shrieks of pain. A stream of ashes from the vaporizing creatures obscured the tunnel.

  A creature with leathery wings flew through the barrage, Henri intercepted it mid-air and brought it down in front of the fire line, he grabbed a maw that formed right on the torso of the creature and pulled it apart until it broke and the creature’s tentacles stopped moving.

  Tony changed the mode on his weapon and let out a wide stream of light above the line, hitting three more of the flying creatures. The soldiers finished them once they hit the ground and they exploded in a half-ash, half-dark oil cloud.

  The ash cloud reached them and still the creatures kept coming, their field of vision diminished.

  “Keep firing!” the Doctor yelled as the sound of the approaching Wraith grew stronger. “Hold the line!”

  A crackling ray of black electricity came through the cloud of debris striking down soldiers and opening a gap in the light defense.

  Thomas saw the silhouette of the elf coming through the cloud. Tasha was now taking command of her new army and leading the charge.

  Thomas knew it was her, although she had transformed into a ghoulish apparition. Her eyes had sunken into her skull and her arms and hands had thinned and grown so much that her claws touched the ground as she walked. Her face had elongated and her mouth was open in a grimace of anger. She wouldn’t be able to speak again — her teeth had become translucent tusks and her throat had bulged over her chest. Only yellow strands of hair and pieces of her clothing remained of her former self.

  With a guttural grunt, Tasha pointed at Thomas. A stream of black energy shot out from her claws, but it was stopped by a brilliant blue shield of energy.

  Elise stepped in front of Thomas speaking in Elven. In front of her, the shield she had conjured grew brighter as the dark energy intensified.

  Henri lunged at Tasha, he flew over the creatures directly at her, but she switched her attack from Elise towards him and the dark energy seemed to grab him, then throw him to the side. Henri crashed among the creatures and they piled on top of him. They saw his arms moving relentlessly flinging and punching at them but there were just too many of them and he was smothered under the monsters.

  “We can’t keep this up for long!” Tony yelled from the frontlines. More and more creatures were coming through the barrage, and some of the soldiers’ weapons had run out of energy. They resorted instead to handguns and their little hand-held flashlights for defense, but they would soon be overwhelmed.

  “Hold it as long as you can!” The Doctor yelled and lifted up his cane, a wave of white energy rippled out from it pushing back all the creatures and buying them a couple of seconds.

  Tasha threw a couple of bolts toward the firing line making gaps in the defense before centering her arms towards Elise, her blue shield taking the brunt of her attack, the shield held on, but it was obvious that she couldn’t take it for much longer.

  The Doctor pulled Thomas to the base of the statue. “You can save us, Thomas.” He pointed at the inscription on the base. “This was placed here by our ancestors in case Ormagra awakened. You can activate it.”

  As bullets flew by his head and creatures shrieked in his ear, Thomas focused on the inscription. He could read it easily, but unlike the code he had broken with the fauns, he felt no power coming from it.

  “This is a spell Doctor! And I’m not a wizard!” he shouted. Maybe if he told Elise the words she could do something with them, but she was already losing ground to Tasha. She had fallen in one knee and straining just to keep her defense up.

  “You don’t have to be,” the Doctor told him. “Words have power. You just need to unleash it.” Thomas frantically looked at the inscription. “Trust yourself, Cypher!” the Doctor yelled.

  Thomas stood behind the statue and began to read aloud the inscription. As the words formed in his mind, they took a rhythm of their own.

  He was barely aware as Elise defense faltered and was struck by a stream of black energy and flung by his side. Tasha’s moan of victory echoed through the cavern as she walked toward Thomas, drool dripping from her talons.

  The line had broken, and most the Guardians were fighting one-on-one against the creatures.

  Scores of creatures rushed toward the statue and Tony and the Doctor stood beside Thomas, trying to make a protective circle around him.

  Again, Tasha lifted a hand towards them, but as the black energy formed on her palms, Bolswaithe jumped in front of her and grappled her arms, pulling them apart and making her attack strike on the walls of the tunnel.

  Maybe Bolswaithe could have subdued Tasha before she had been imbued with Wraith energy, but her strength and power had grown tenfold, she was now more of a beast than an elven Queen and just like the beasts she had become she bit down hard on the butler, first on his right elbow, that broke and bent downward, and then on his head, a crystalline tusk shattering as she clamp down on the butler’s face.

  Bolswaithe’s strength faltered and she flung him aside like a broken doll.

  Thomas kept reading and the words echoed again and again inside his brain. He felt energy coursing through him. The strength of the humans that had placed the statue against the Ormagran ancients filled him, their energy surging through his veins. He recited the words over and over, then stepped away from the inscription and walked beside the statue. The lesser Wraith creatures vaporizing as they approached him.

  All became silent for Thomas. His grandfather’s face flashed before his eyes. “Just be brave,” his grandpa always said. Thomas stood tall, powerful.

  Tasha threw a bolt of black energy, but the energy dissipated before touching his body.

  He was untouchable, a conduit for ancient power to course through.

  Thomas smiled at Tasha.

  As the creatures poured from Ormagra, the statue of Perseus began to glow in a golden hue. Its eyes opened and the statue lifted the head of Medusa in front of him.

  Tasha tried to lunge at Thomas with her claws, but he lifted a hand and she was thrown back against the wall.

  She stood up again and with a sickly crunch, leathery wings sprouted from her back. With a last roar of pure rage, she flew away and retreated into Ormagra, disappearing into its darkness.

  The statue began to echo the words Thomas was reciting in a booming voice, and as they finished the inscription, Medusa’s eyes opened and a flash of pure light exploded outwards, filling the cave and the whole city in a golden glow.

  Thomas collapsed. The creatures Tasha had woken from their millennial slumber turned into stone, but the gruesome creature Tasha had become was not among the forest of statues.

  Henri broke out from under a moun
tain of stone limbs and Guardians helped Bolswaithe up. The butler turned around holding his broken arm at the elbow, his hair singed, his face covered in a black substance and his right his eye completely shut down.

  “Is Thomas alright?” he asked.

  Tony picked up Thomas from the ground and the Doctor passed his cane over him, a dim light bathed his body.

  “Of course he is,” the Doctor said, “he is our Cypher.”

  A Little Adventure

  Thomas finished the third chapter of Return of the Nautilus, and closed the book with his forearm. His hands were bandaged because of the cuts he had sustained in the obsidian tunnel.

  Although the doctors at the medical ward had given him a clean bill of health, Bolswaithe insisted that he stay in bed for a day or two. The butler’s hair had been repaired of the damage and even upgraded to a more distinguished look. The balding circle at the back of his head had disappeared and his hair was a little bit longer and fuller. His arm was on a sling and his head bandaged, not because it needed to be, but because he still wanted to keep appearances with Tony and Henri.

  Tasha and her technician were listed among the twenty seven casualties of the battle; a number that Thomas thought was very low after living through it, but unacceptable for the Doctor who felt that they had fallen complacent and secure after five hundred years of controlling the Book of Concord and were completely unprepared against the Wraith. He immediately ordered a full production run of Tony’s prototype weapon and increased research of technologies specific to counter the Wraith.

  Many of the soldiers that had been in the battle needed some psychiatric evaluation and counseling after being exposed to Wraith creatures, some even had to be sent to mental wards for treatment, but Thomas felt fine, he’d seen monsters. That was all.

  There was a knock on the door. “Come in,” Thomas said. Doctor Franco entered the room carrying a cup of tea. Wisps of steam overflowed the cup and seemed to dance over it.

  “King Seryaan sends his regards and a little medicine,” the Doctor said placing the cup in Thomas’s hands. “Go on,” he encouraged him.